Some years ago
incandescens sent me vols 1-9 of Hatsu Akiko's Strange Tales of the Rainy Willow Store. I have happy memories of sitting on a bench outside the local Blahblah's supermarket, sipping one of their lattes and reading Strange Meiji Tales. Now when would that have been, I wondered? Not 2002-- that summer was too hot and I was reading Hi Izuru. Mid-2003, more likely, a grey coolish and *very* rainy spring. (Roof sprang a leak and flooded the bedroom. These things one doesn't forget.) Then I thought, check the relevant folder in Outlook Express, why not? Did.Mid-December 2003. A cold and snowy winter, as I also well recall, because the snow very kindly stopped in February when I had my tum cut open and was no longer able to shovel it. I never sat outside Blahblah's in the cool grey, sipping lattes and reading Rainy Willow, in spite of the fact that I can so clearly see me doing it.
